# Wasted The red "Wasted" death screen from Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto series became an internet shorthand for failure, with editors slapping the slow-motion black-and-white filter onto real-world fail clips starting in 2014. A dedicated subreddit and a wave of CollegeHumor and YouTube compilations turned the GTA V screen into a go-to template for pain-themed reaction edits. ## Origin The caption first appeared in the original Grand Theft Auto in 1997, with Grand Theft Auto 2 adding an announcer who cheerfully called out the word. The visual format people now edit over fail clips comes from Grand Theft Auto IV, where the character dies in slow motion under a desaturated filter before the red Wasted text appears, a treatment Rockstar kept for GTA V[3]. The game-screen footage itself is widely preserved on YouTube, including uploads showing the GTA V death sequence that editors sample from[4]. Rockstar made the screen; the meme itself is a fan edit tradition built on top of that asset, so the format's original editor is not individually credited. - **Platform:** Grand Theft Auto (video game) / Reddit (viral spread) - **Creator:** Unknown - **Date:** 1997 ## Overview Wasted is the red block-letter death notification Rockstar Games shows when a player character dies in Grand Theft Auto. The modern version everybody edits came with Grand Theft Auto IV in 2008 and carried over into Grand Theft Auto V, pairing slow-motion footage with a black-and-white filter before the word Wasted drops in red[3]. As an edit format, the joke is simple. Take any clip of someone falling off a skateboard, getting hit by a door or otherwise biting it, freeze the frame at impact, drain the color, add the font and the melancholy orchestral sting, and the fail becomes a GTA death[1]. The template works because it reframes real pain as a video-game respawn, cushioning the wince with recognition for anyone who played GTA IV or V. The accompanying slang predates the meme by decades. Urban Dictionary entries note that "wasted" has long covered both heavy intoxication and getting killed, which is why the in-game caption lands as a punchline rather than a straight description[2]. ## How It Spread The dedicated hub arrived on January 8th, 2014, when the r/WastedGifs subreddit launched to collect animated GIFs that spliced the GTA screen onto real-world crashes and pratfalls[1]. From there the format traveled quickly through aggregator sites. On April 25th, 2014, CollegeHumor published a roundup of notable Wasted GIFs, and Smosh followed on May 14th with its own compilation of GTA-style Wasted edits[1]. YouTube filled in with montage uploads: Szczery Jerry posted "Wasted in real life" on May 9th, 2014, and the clip drew more than 200,000 views and 280 comments inside four months[1]. YouTuber mari cano uploaded a similar FAIL-video montage on May 11th, 2014[2]. On May 24th, 2014, GIFs With Sound 2 uploaded another montage stitching Wasted edits together with their audio stings, part of the sound-GIF subculture that leaned on the format for easy payoff clips[5]. The template never left: Rockstar kept the same screen in GTA V, so edits made ten years apart still read as the same joke. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Wasted? Wasted is the red death-screen caption from Grand Theft Auto that fans edit over real-world fail clips, usually with a slow-motion black-and-white filter copied from Grand Theft Auto IV and V[1]. ### Where did Wasted come from? The caption first appeared in the original Grand Theft Auto in 1997, and the current slow-motion black-and-white version debuted with Grand Theft Auto IV in 2008[1]. ### What does Wasted mean? In GTA it means the player character has died, drawing on older slang that uses "wasted" for both being killed and being heavily intoxicated[3]. ### How do you use Wasted? Editors typically take a clip of someone falling or crashing, freeze on the impact, drain the color, and drop the red Wasted text in with the GTA sting, as collected on r/WastedGifs starting in January 2014[1]. ### Is Wasted still popular? The format spiked in 2014 with the r/WastedGifs subreddit and compilations on CollegeHumor, Smosh and YouTube, and because Rockstar kept the same death screen in GTA V the edits still read as current[1][2]. ## References 1. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoqKYypFw-I]() 2. [https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Wasted]() 3. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/wasted]() 4. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUvyqAQrFcw]() 5. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZRwoLZLcN8]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/wasted Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library